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“Today we moved into our new Facebook building”

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Re: “Today we moved into our new Facebook building”

#231

Post by JohnBooty »

correctbattery wrote: post #210
JohnBooty wrote: post #160

I would literally switch jobs (and perhaps careers, if every company was like this) if forced to work in an open office like this. I cannot work that way; I can't focus. I realize that I'm adding nothing constructive to this thread; I don't care. Maybe some manager somewhere will see this and a hundred other anecdotal opinions and think twice about open offices. I am the opposite of a prima donna. I just want to work…

I hear you. I work at Facebook, albeit in Seattle. Honestly, I'd prefer private offices too. I prefer complete silence for coding. (Okay, occasionally jazz, classical, or video game music.) I don't get that with our open plan office. BUT! 1) I can work from home as often as I want 2) we get free, very high quality headphones, and 3) there are quiet spaces I can use when necessary. Coming from Microsoft, I miss privat…

That seems like a good blend of collaborative and solo time. I once had a job where I worked from home two days a week and it worked quite well.

Socializing about coding is actually my favorite part of my current job. At my previous position I was the only full-time engineer. One reason I took my current job was the chance to work with a team of talented people, most of whom are more experienced (with this technology stack) than me.

Re: “Today we moved into our new Facebook building”

#232

Post by Smoofer »

fsk wrote: post #108
moe wrote: post #81

a single room that fits thousands of people. What a nightmare. These "glass palace" offices may work for bankers or marketing teams. For programmers you could just as well plant their desks into the middle of a mall.

The offensive part is the people who say that open offices are MORE EFFICIENT than a traditional office. I have a hard time believing that one. Given how high programmer salaries are, the productivity loss due to open offices is almost definitely more than the office space savings. It seems like an introvert/extrovert thing. The introverts would prefer a quiet working space (and they're usually the best workers), but…

This is like every tired introvert/extrovert stereotype all combined into one post.

No one person is fully introverted/extroverted. Everyone appreciates alone/quiet time to an extent and appreciates other people's company to an extent. It's way more of a spectrum than it is a black and white status.

I love meeting new people and going to social events, but I also have no problem spending time alone working on projects. What am I? A worker or a boss?

Re: “Today we moved into our new Facebook building”

#233

Post by JohnBooty »

correctbattery wrote: post #211
correctbattery wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hear you. I work at Facebook, albeit in Seattle. Honestly, I'd prefer private offices too. I prefer complete silence for coding. (Okay, occasionally jazz, classical, or video game music.) I don't get that with our open plan office. BUT! 1) I can work from home as often as I want 2) we get free, very high quality headphones, and 3) there are quiet spaces I can use when necessary. Coming from Microsoft, I miss privat…

One reason I rent a two bedroom apartment is so that I can have an office at home.

Having some sort of dedicated home office space is soooooo key. Otherwise there's almost no boundary at all between work life and home life. It becomes hard to mentally get into "work mode" when the work day starts and it's hard to fully out of "work mode" when the work day is over.

Over the years I've found that the vast majority of work-from-homers share this opinion. Almost unanimously.

Re: “Today we moved into our new Facebook building”

#235

Post by sdrothrock »

vlunkr wrote: post #30
option wrote: post #7

Having worked as researcher/dev in both private office and open space setup, I am absolutely convinced that private offices are way more productive than open office setup for researchers and developers. Most, if not all, of my colleagues feel the same. In fact, I don't think I will ever accept an offer from a mature company (not startup) which houses its developers in open space.

For me, open office + headphones = private office. At a vastly reduced cost. I know that doesn't work for everyone though.

I work in an open-ish office and have two problems with this:

1. I have glasses and a hearing aid (cochlear implant) and have yet to find headphones that don't make my left ear/head throb with pain after more than six hours.

2. Visual distractions: people walking through, people seemingly approaching me (but actually approaching someone nearby), people waving, etc. are all just as bad as auditory distractions, if not worse for me personally since I tend to rely heavily on vision to replace what I can't hear.

Re: “Today we moved into our new Facebook building”

#236

Post by girvo »

correctbattery wrote: post #211
correctbattery wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hear you. I work at Facebook, albeit in Seattle. Honestly, I'd prefer private offices too. I prefer complete silence for coding. (Okay, occasionally jazz, classical, or video game music.) I don't get that with our open plan office. BUT! 1) I can work from home as often as I want 2) we get free, very high quality headphones, and 3) there are quiet spaces I can use when necessary. Coming from Microsoft, I miss privat…

One reason I rent a two bedroom apartment is so that I can have an office at home.

I rent a one-bedroom on my own, but it has a huge lounge with a desk, power points and cable connection on one side. Works brilliantly for me, though my iMac I have living on the desk is getting so long in the tooth I barely use it anymore. Bit of a shame really, I like having a dedicated desktop. I think I need to get a Mac Pro...

Re: “Today we moved into our new Facebook building”

#237

Post by chrisseaton »

p1esk wrote: post #155
option wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just have some respect for yourself - do not accept job offer if you don't get an office (unless it is a very early stage startup)

Only if you're looking for a job as a CEO

At Oracle I got my own office as an intern

Re: “Today we moved into our new Facebook building”

#238

Post by [deleted] »

JohnBooty wrote: post #224
Jonovono wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I always think the best would be a bit of both. Having the option to go in a private room and do your work or work out in an open area with people where you can easily throw around ideas and what not. But i've never had a problem in an open space. You don't wear headphones or a way to indicate to others to not disturb you? And surely you can see where some of the other things you talk about are good for you right? 'c…

I totally agree: most engineers need to engage in both modes of work (solo and collaborative) in the course of their work week. The collaborative time is crucial: I've worked in places where there was no culture of collaboration; sometimes programmers working solo would "go dark," spend days going in the wrong direction, or spend inordinate amounts of time spinning their wheels because they were stuck on technical is…

[deleted]

Re: “Today we moved into our new Facebook building”

#239

Post by bbarn »

My least and most favorite topic rears it's head again. The open floor plan. Here's what I've come to think is about perfect:

The open floor plan, with +-3 hour start/end time to your 8 hour work day (from say, 8:30-5), with optional hour lunch (paid or unpaid depending on policy/culture).

Think about it.. there are definitely collaboration benefits to be had with the open floorplan. The contrast to that is always the "engineer needs alone time" bit. I get it, I work well both ways, but as others have said, you can't do all of either all of the time. That's where true flexibility in working schedule comes in.

Like your quiet time? Come in at 6 and leave at 3. Or come in at 11, and leave at 7. The bulk of the office will tend to come in near the societal norm of 9-5, especially those who like the collaborative bit the most, and that leaves you the ends to pick from. Entire office likes to get together for group hour long lunches? Skip it and work. The idea is, if you honestly can't fit the work you need to do into blocks of time at the ends or middle of the day when the office naturally quiets down, you've got a bigger problem than the distractions of the office. The idea that you must have 8 hours of quiet or near quiet to do your job means you're not that good at doing your job, or your job role is too demanding for a reasonable person to do. If it's truly the case, you're likely SO good at what you do someone's noticed and you're getting what you want already.

Re: “Today we moved into our new Facebook building”

#240

Post by abalone »

choppaface wrote: post #178
JohnBooty wrote: post #160

I would literally switch jobs (and perhaps careers, if every company was like this) if forced to work in an open office like this. I cannot work that way; I can't focus. I realize that I'm adding nothing constructive to this thread; I don't care. Maybe some manager somewhere will see this and a hundred other anecdotal opinions and think twice about open offices. I am the opposite of a prima donna. I just want to work…

I've worked in an exclusively open format office and it can be hard at times. Ideally you can find 2-3 spots to work: your desk near your team, a reliably (tho perhaps non-reservable) quiet spot for focusing, and an (perhaps unreliable) quiet spot for super privacy (e.g. a conference room ). The most damaging part of the open format (for me) is that extroverted ops folk would fight fires all day and make tons of nois…

I like your 3-spot system, but JohnBooty is actually describing a 3-spot system too. He's just saying he wants to spend the majority of his time in the "quiet focus" spot rather than the "team collaboration" spot.

That's really the issue here: what should your default zone be?

I like your suggestion that the default location for your desk should be in the collaborative spot. Cornell studied this a few years back and made an interesting observation: We engineers tend to prioritize our personal productivity over team productivity. Left to our own devices, we prioritize offices for exactly the reasons JohnBooty states. Personal productivity is how we're most directly measured and rewarded. But if we do that, team collaboration plummets. It's a lot harder to pull ourselves out of our focus zones into collaboration mode than it is the other way.

So, I don't know if FB's new office has quiet spots (they should), but defaulting to collaborative seating acts as a good counterbalance to our innate biases.

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